Los ninos jugaban

Question

Why is this translated as The children were playing and not The children used to play?  I wonder if the chosen translation depends on the context?

Accepted Answer

Hola Nancy
Yes, it depends on the context. Here in this lesson we are explaining how the imperfect tense is used to "describe" and this sentence is describing  a setting - pretty much saying what "was happening", so:

En el parque los niños jugaban, la gente paseaba a sus perros, algunos hacían footing...
In the park the kids were playing, people were walking their dogs, some were jogging...

However we could also say something like:

Cuando vivíamos en España, mis hijos jugaban mucho en la calle porque casi siempre estaba soleado.
When we lived in Spain, my children used to play a lot in the street because it used to be sunny nearly all the time.

Here it's a different context (used to) 
Saludos
Inma